The Hindu Business Line : Unlearning to learn

If you have seen the film The Karate Kid, you would have seen how the master gives the pupil one simple task at a time. Initially it seemed a waste of time, but the learning was deeply internalised.

LEARNING LIKE A CHILD HELPS. If you watch children, they jump into every activity without fear of failure or harm. That could be the reason they learn faster than adults.

The advertisement in which a grown man rushes to his son's school to find out how he can get cricket scores on his mobile phone struck a chord in me. I must confess that I have had many such experiences that have highlighted my ignorance and lack of a practical education. I have also, much to my mortification, learnt that children are far superior learners when compared with adults.

My seven-year-old son and I had enrolled in a 21-day summer swimming camp. My son learnt to float in two days. I was still standing by the edge of the pool and there were just seven days left. I had this great need for having at least one of my feet firmly planted on the ground. Having paid a sizable amount for the camp, I felt compelled to come to the pool daily. By then, the coach in charge of our batch had given up on me. I consoled myself saying that even if I didn't swim, my life would go on as usual. Another coach was now entrusted with the task of at least getting me to float. He started from scratch. For the first two days he did not even talk about floating. He gave me small tasks such as holding my breath and so on. By then I was quite bored with the small and easy tasks. Soon I was floating and swimming competently in the deep waters of the non-corporate variety.

I tried to make sense of the fact that my child seemed to be a better learner than me. I contemplated why my superior education and knowledge of learning theories were not helping me. I now have the belief that unlearning is an essential part of the learning cycle. In Indian mythology, we have Brahma and Shiva co-existing to highlight that creation goes hand-in-hand with destruction. As an adult learner, one has to wipe the slate clean of the vast amount of what "I already know". You can learn better if you leave the baggage of wisdom behind and make learning a fun activity. That is possible if you:

Learn like a child. If you watch children, they jump into every activity without fear of failure or harm. That could be the reason they learn faster than adults. The burden of the wisdom we have gathered seems to slow us down. If you wanted to learn a new game, say Softball, as an adult you are more likely to watch a video or read about it. A child would simply go with a friend, grab a ball and bat and start playing.

Keep your mind uncluttered and free like that of a child. You may have heard the story of a famous Zen master and his visitor who was an erudite professor. While the master quietly served tea, the professor talked about Zen. The master poured the visitor's cup to the brim, and then kept pouring. The professor watched the overflowing cup and chided the Zen master, "You are wasting the tea! No more will go in!" The master replied, "Until you empty your cup, how can I fill it up with fresh tea?"

Do not practise complicated theories. There are lots of theories on learning styles. People are encouraged to seek inputs and stimuli according to their style. All that knowledge did not work when my hapless tennis coach tried to get me to swing my racquet. I was concentrating so much that I failed. It took me a lot of time to relax my body and learn to let go.

Break the task into miniscule but achievable steps. If you have seen the film The Karate Kid, you would have seen how the master gives the pupil one simple task at a time. Initially it seemed a waste of time, but the learning was deeply internalised.

Get a teacher who reinforces your belief in learning. By now, you probably know that I am hopeless at physical tasks. For the life of me, I couldn't balance a two-wheeler. Ultimately my friend gave me his brand new bike and asked me to drive it with him as the pillion rider. He seemed to place so much faith in me that I went for a drive in a crowded market and the bike and I survived without a scratch.

In any creative process there is divergence and convergence. Unlearning is needed for divergent thinking. Structured and erudite learning is needed to converge and complete the process. An organisation which values individual learning as a vehicle for reaching organisational goals, will be a happy place to work in. Organisations need to structure their work so that tasks provide opportunities for uninterrupted learning. Learning is not as complicated as it seems. It is simply taking tiny footsteps and covering a lot of ground.

(The writer, an alumnus of XLRI, is a freelance HR consultant and trainer)

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